There’s something about light

The dazzling and multifaceted shimmers of the mirrorball are still etched in my mind after the recent work in progress showing of Caroline’s show [insert name here]*

Since then I’ve been thinking a lot about light. Or maybe I’ve noticed things about light that were there before, but that I took for granted. The way that light flickers through the trees in the evening; moments of overwhelming brightness interspersed with orange hues, or snippets of light wavering in abstract forms. There’s something about light that’s evocative and touches (not literally) the self.

On a basic level light is really electromagnetic radiation within the electromagnetic spectrum. I suppose what I’m referring to here is visible light, visible to the human eye and responsible for the sense of sight.

Much has been written about the relation between light and emotion. This makes me think of the potential of light as a medium in aesthetic practice. In a magazine article by Niamh Coghlan, she notes that:

The use of light as an artistic medium, as something to be engaged with, is intrinsically tied to an audience’s liminal ability to perceive a sensory experience.